The Kellien 1st : The Tomb of Aduadin
by Dabigredwun
Summary: It's the start of the 42nd millennium and the Imperium is assaulted from all sides. This story follows the Kellien 1st's formation and their part in a plot that threatens to destroy the eastern fringe of the Imperium.


Disclaimer: I don't own anything, everything in this fic belongs to its respective owners.

AN: should note a couple of things, the Kelliens are influenced by the "March up country/to the sea/to the stars" series written by David Webber and John Ringo. For those that do know what I'm talking about they are a mix between my favourite character Portana and the Mardukians. Everyone else should just ignore it or go read the series.

_Italics _normally mean thoughts but if I use them during speech '_Like this' _it means the person speaking isn't using the imperial language of low Gothic.

Last thing of note is since this series is going into the 42nd millennium nothing pertaining to the timeline past M41 is canon, I'll try and keep things as warhammery as possible but I subscribe to the Sandy Mitchell's theory of Warhammer which is grim dark is great and all but not everything has to be suicidally depressing.

**It is the beginning of the 42****nd**** millennium the date 011M42. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor of Mankind has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth. He is the master of mankind by the will of the gods, and master of a million worlds by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass, writhing invisibly with the power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, it was thought that this would make him never truly able to die but the Throne is now failing and each day the Astronomican, the key to the Imperium dims ever so slightly.**

**Yet even in his dying state the Emperor continues his duty. Mighty battle-fleets cross the demon infested miasma of the warp, the only route between distant stars. Vast armies give battle in his name on uncounted worlds. Greatest amongst his soldiers are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines, bio-engineered super-warriors. Their comrades in arms are legion: the Imperial Guard and countless planetary defence forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition and the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus to name only a few.**

**But for all their multitudes, they are barely enough to hold of the ever-present threats from aliens, heretics, mutants and worse. Necrons, long idle are now rising from their tombs with increasing regularity and viciousness to continue the long stalled genocide of a galaxy. A new Tyranid hive fleet from another galaxy arrives in seemingly limitless numbers, carrying new and terrifying creatures seeking to consume all organic matter. The Eye of Terror from which Abaddon launches his endless black crusades has gone eerily quiet, some think for the largest crusade yet that will send millions into insanity and bring death to the rest. The Eldar race is dying, more and more fall to the increasing tempo of battle, they simply cannot replace what they are losing which leaves more room for their dark brethren to battle, plunger, pillage, rape and torture. With the Imperial efforts directed to more dire threats the Tau launch pacification campaigns one after another to take as much land as they can for their so called greater good, the same tactic being used by the lost and the damned armies, independent kingdoms amongst the stars, some simply no longer wanting to bow to an uncaring Imperium while others fell to the machinations of chaos. Through all this Ork populations are reaching bursting point more and more often as bigger and deadlier Waaaghs happen with more frequency plunging entire sectors into war.**

**To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions in a slowly collapsing empire. It is to live in the cruellest and most bloody regime imaginable with the light of the future dying slowly. These are the tales of the Kellien 1****st**** just one of many new regiments being thrown into the front line to hold off collapse.**

'By the throne I hate this planet. The rain especially.' Brigadier Julius Hethrodge muttered in his slightly deep voice as he stared out a window. He wasn't a very large man even at 40 years of age, in fact he didn't look out of the ordinary for a Cadian, purple eyes, brown hair and Caucasian skin with a slight tan. It was raining, sometimes he thought all this planet did was rain. It wasn't even cold rain despite the fact it seemed to be falling sideways. It was water, hot and humid dropping from the sky. Slapping his forehead he exclaimed.

'And the heat, can't frakking forget the heat!' Just as it always seemed to rain it was always hot, and also like the rain it wasn't a bearable heat it was always in the 50's with the humidity turned up so high there probably wasn't a dry ass on the planet. Even in his lime green collared shirt and shorts, in the middle of a hab block's gymnasium with the air con turned on it barely helped, sweat oozed from everywhere on his body.

'Gotta agree there.' Colonel Catherine Andrews spoke through gritted teeth as she wiped her forehead for what seemed to be the millionth time, they were both surprised she hadn't rubbed the skin off yet. The colonel was from the ice world of Valhalla and only 30 years old which meant she was paper white, almost white blond hair and light blue eyes. She was dressed pretty much the same way as him but instead of the Cadian badge sown onto the side of his uniform she had the valhallen badge. Turning his head from the unending green that was the jungle which seemed to cover Kellien he fixed his look on his second in command.

'Yea you've probably got it worse than me.' Julius a veteran of four major campaigns on a variety of worlds had man experiences with wild weather, Catherine on the other hand had only been in two and both of those were on similar planets to the frozen ice ball she called home.

'It's not like I'm enjoying it either.' The last member of the table spoke up. Major Rajesh Shimona spoke in his deep base voice. He was from Tallarn a desert planet so naturally came with dark brown skin to protect him from the sun, black hair and brown eyes were also very common for his planet and a whole of 27 years of age. Again dressed the same as the other two with the same sweat stains.

'You're from a desert planet you know this right?' Julius groaned, there wasn't much else he could do with such suppressive heat pressing down on them, this day seemingly particularly bad even for this planet.

'The heat's better on Tallarn because at least it's-'

'A dry heat.' All three said at once which elicited half-hearted chuckles from all three. They had been through the same conversation many times. A quick knock at the door made all three sit up straight and try to look presentable.

'Enter.' Julius put on his command voice. A bald headed sergeant opened the door just enough to stick his head in. The room was pretty empty with the table they were sitting at in the middle of the room. A single chair was in front of the trio.

'Next applicant is here sir.'

'Send them in Sergeant Miller.' Miller may have been only a sergeant but was the only other Cadian on the planet which meant he got an easy job as Julius's assistant.

'Right away sir.' The door then swung open and revealed the entire reason they were here. A bit of back story on the planet of Kellien may be in order as it will explain why soldiers from many different planets were being thrown together. Kellien was a recent addition to the Imperium. Specifically it had only been in the loving clutch of Terra for two hundred years. Now this normally would not be a problem, a quick religious conversion and show of force and the world would be ready to be a worthwhile edition to the Imperium. Not in Kelliens case.

Kellien is located not that far from the tau/imperial border. The planet when brought into the fold was only at the tribal stage of development. It was a strange tribal stage, las guns and power weapons readily available all around but tribal nevertheless. The Imperials conquering of the planet was probably the second easiest objective completed. A couple of Valkyries landing made clear to all but the most stubborn tribes accept the new rulers with open arms. The easiest thing and coincidently the second thing they did was convert the population to the Imperial Cult. A few priest's threw some lightning around, due to the lack of psykers on the planet near everyone started worshipping the priests as gods, a quick clear up of that misunderstanding and all firmly accepted the Emperor as god, albeit in a strange way.

From there things went downhill. While not a death planet since most animals can and are domesticated there are plenty of hostile creatures all across the planet which makes building new cities a pain especially when the natives don't want to fight the creatures since most are bonded to a creature at a young age. Yes when the native Kelliens turn 10 they steal/take/are offered offspring from the various creatures on the planet and basically become sort of pseudo-married to an animal. The prospect of wild animals on the streets and the smell scares away many of the more advanced colonists.

A final problem is while the natives may accept the emperor and Imperial rule they don't always show it the right way, there have been two planetary governor "assassinations" when the governor tried to force the population labour day and night to build the Imperial capital of the planet. The governors sent out the small garrison they were allocated to force the Kelliens to start working, the garrisons were never heard from again and shortly later the governors were found in bed with their throats slit. Reprisals were non-existent since the only soldiers left on planet were off worlders who wouldn't last very long against the natural sniper, hunters and their animal partners.

So when an administratem officer was told to send out orders to raise a regiment from Kellien they slapped together a rag-tag training core from the recruitment pool and shipped them to this planet. While certainly diverse in the officer department the regiment wasn't ever going to be much more than 1000 people. Since it will be the first regiment raised from this planet it needed to make a good impression so here they were, a Cadian, Tallarian and a valhallen interviewing every potential recruit.

This recruit was a young looking man, average height, exceptional physique easily seen since he only wore a loincloth. Blue eyes and a long braided ponytail, dark purple in colour. Eye and hair colours ranged incredibly, there were many theories due to the colourful food gathered from the jungle. Like Major Rajesh they had brown skin, considerably lighter due to the jungle canopy but much darker than any Caucasian could get without purposely tanning for long periods. Trotting next to the man was what looked kind of like a chicken except it had scales and spikes instead of feathers and Julius knew for a fact it had sharp teeth in that beak.

Grabbing the data-slate in front of him Julius began the interview. 'Name?'

'Obo.' He said quickly.

'Full name.' Catherine sighed.

'Obo Sejeni.' After typing it in the major spoke, they all took it in turns since one thing it kept the applicant off balance and another was it was too tiring to do the interview all by yourself.

'Why do you want to join the Imperial Guard?' Obo looked around a bit nervously.

'_Uhhh... what ke?' _ Julius slightly slapped the data-slate against his head. The only thing he recognised in that entire sentence was the ke, the Kelliens used it as an unofficial "I've got nothing to add after this" which led to some awkward silences with off worlders as the Kelliens would wait because it was considered extremely rude to interrupt someone, like picking your nose then wiping it on someone else's sleeve.

'I don't frakking believe this.' Looking Obo right in the eye he said. 'Do you even speak Low Gothic?'

_'Dunno what you saying boss-man ke.'___All three off worlders groaned. It was a common problem on this planet the only natives that learned Imperial were the ones that lived in or near the spaceport/capital the rest didn't really have much of a need to learn yet.

'**MILLER!'** He yelled. The sergeant stuck his head back in.

'Yes sir?'

'Get a frakking translator in here now.'

'Right away sir.' Obo looked at the door then back to the three.

'_You mooka's gotta calm down ke.' _Unfortunately for Obo all three knew exactly what mooka meant a native insult to off worlders. You had to when every native thought they could get away with it.

'Miller get this asshole outa here now!' As Miller led an even more confused Obo away all three leaned back in their chairs. Julius grabbed a nearby glass of supposedly icy water which turned out to be only slightly cold after 5 minutes in the open. Pressing it against his neck he sighed.

'Can't let em get to you sir.' Catherine suggested as she took a sip of warm tanna tea a frankly terrible tasting drink in Julius's opinion.

'I know I know, for the love of the Emperor tell me we're near the end of the cut-off date tho.' The cut off was only a month away before they stopped recruiting and focused solely on training for 6 months before shipping out. They were around the 800 mark last time he checked, while not many native Kelliens were in officer or administrative roles since that require being able to operate computers they had more fighting troops then average.

'Soon Sir, you know that.' Catherine was right, they were all marking down the days till they got of the sweat-box the Kelliens called a planet. A sudden bleeping noise from the major's data-slate caught their attention. After a short time reading Rajesh smiled darkly.

'The new commissar will be landing tomorrow.' Catherine and Julius chuckled.

'What is this the 5th of 6th one?' Julius asked.

'7th.' The valhallen replied.

'7th? Did I miss one or something?'

'Commissar Sadrea was only here for like a week.' she told him.

'Oh that's right... what's the pool like?' A quick series of button presses and Rajesh had the answer. After the second commissar bought a plot the off world soldiers took bets on how long future commissars would last.

'Quarter lasting one week ending in EBW/SEBW bout half on 2 weeks with another quarter on 3.' Drumming his fingers on the table Julius thought for a bit. Commissars had an extremely low survival rate, six already dead and the regiment hadn't even been formed yet. Turns out the Kelliens don't much care for being executed, the first three tried ordering firing squads and were promptly murdered, two tried immediately carrying out the sentence but Kelliens were wicked fast, mainly due to the fact they hunted larger/faster and stronger animals then humans. The last one tried to shoot a Kellien animal companion and just disappeared, at least the other ones left corpses.

Due to the Kellien lack of technical expertise and abundance of animals whenever a commissar died they were marked as EBW, eaten by wildlife to save time and paperwork. This became a running joke as whenever something went missing it was marked as EBW, SEBW originated on the 5th commissars death when clear las burns were found on the half eaten body, Julius wanting to make it to retirement marked it as SEBW, shot then eaten by wildlife in the hope no one noticed his form amongst all the others.

'What do we know about the new commissar?' He asked.

'Fresh out of the schola, trained by Cain if you can believe it.' Cain the hero of the Imperium, that was interesting.

'Well then put me down for 50 creds on three weeks, SEBW.' his reasoning being they might not be so pigheaded so they would last longer, and being trained well that an animal wouldn't snap their neck before a Kellien shot them.

'Done.' a few taps and the major was indeed finished. A knock on the door signalled the next applicant had arrived.

**OoOoOoOoO**

Nideen Jesner, Nid as her friends liked to call her was staring intently at a poster of a man in strange armour pointing directly at her. She was slightly taller than average with a strong physique, a bit darker skin than normal having spent most of her 20 years in the sun, Dark red eyes and a very very long black haired pony tail going to her waist. Standing in some Imperial army issue boots and lime green pants she traded some skins for and traditional hunting leather jerkin she looked like an odd fusion of old and new, especially with her las rifle around her back. A strange looking animal sat next to her.

It looked kind of like a wolf but larger, almost up to her chest sitting down. It didn't have thin legs tho they were thick and like the rest of its body covered in black and red exoskeleton instead of fur. Its tail was long and thin tho not puffy like a wolf and its mouth had insect like mandibles to the side of its mouth and no ears. A long almost like a thinner tail extended from the back of its head but always kept slightly off its body. Its eyes tho were blood red like Nid's but reptilian. It was of course a Kellien patex named Gav a curious reptile/insect cross-breed and her companion for many years, normally a pack hunter this one was raised by Nid and the two were inseparable.

'_Yo Quen k'mere 'n tell me what dis say's ke?'___Quen Idona strolled over to her. He was smaller than her with green hair and eyes but dressed in a full suit of Imperial Guard clothing. The son of her tribe's chief he was educated and spoke low Gothic easily even pronouncing the "th" that the natives had trouble with. He had a sort of monkey/patex hybrid clamped on his shoulder, a punjab as the animal was called with a green exoskeleton. Her people did like their companions the same colour it helped build familiarity.

'_What can't read Gothic yet? You're going to have to learn someday if you're going to get along with those mooka's to the north ke.'_ The landing area was a massive flattened piece of land, probably the only seriously deforested area on the planet and where all the off worlders gathered.

'Scree...' After the screech Gav clicked a bit in annoyance. The animal wasn't intelligent enough to know the full range of human language but he was cunning enough to know what mooka was, at least the animals interpretation of it. Loud bastards. More than once the patex has been set of screeching as it was woken by a passing ship. Giving a comforting stroke to Gav's head Nid told Quen.

'_Yea yea I'll learn the mooka language later just read dis for me ke.'_ Mooka actual meaning was a god from before the Imperials showed up. Specifically he was a god that fell from the sky and hit his head... hard, calling someone a mooka was basically saying they were an idiot from the sky which lended itself easily to the strange people from off planet. Quen gave the poster a quick glace before telling her.

'_It just says "Join the Imperial Guard."_' Looking a bit lower he continued._ '"Do your duty to the Emperor today".'_

'_Eh tat's lot better den da earlier ones dey had ke.'_ The earlier ones were always shouting about glory, honour and the like which fell flat against the Kelliens who believed a quick kick in the nuts and some dirty fighting was better any day of the week to glory and honour.

_'True.' _Quen told her, she rubbed her chin thoughtfully for a moment.

_'Da Emperor... Mebbe I join. Be good to have him on ya side yeh, he protect dis place from dose xeno, mutants and heretic's the priests say wanna burn dis place down ke.'_ Kelliens worship of the Emperor was different to say the least, they didn't believe in yelling and screaming his name all the time, also all the preying would just get on his nerves because "who in dere right minds wants a bunch of people bottering t'em all da time." So most Kelliens practised a quieter and low scale approach to venerating the emperor. Another curious side effect is they believed the Emperor would literally punish them for going against him.

One more thing about Kellien religion is they believed whole heartedly in spirits which one would think would put them in good graces with the Adeptus Mechanicus. One would be wrong. Spirits to Kelliens were not things to be venerated but simply a type of person inhabiting something else, and of course susceptible to bribes/blackmail and physical violence. The proper church had voted that all in all it was an acceptable deviation despite the angry mutterings of one or two tech-priests.

_'Mebbe you do Mebbe you don't right now tho we gotta get going if you're not joining this moment ke.'_ Looking away from the poster stapled to a tree in their village and noticed the other hunters had arrived. The village named Kilik was standard for Kellien, houses built into the trees that were kilometre high with walkways above the ground and no huts or dwellings directly on the floor. The rain had stopped and the blue-green sun was barely viable through the canopy.

_'Righto, whose boss for dis little venture ke?'_ She asked the assembled gathering of 10 including her and Quen, not counting the animal companions. Like the planet itself the assembled hunters were a mix of old and new, lasguns, power knives and some clothes showed the new while simple leather and scale clothing pointed to the old. Before the Imperials arrived no one on Kellien knew how the lasguns worked, how they kept functional or how their power knives/swords and the like worked. All they did was stop using it for a few days and left it in the sun where unbeknownst to them the sun and extreme heat of the planet would charge it over the week.

_'I can lead, saw a wounded Karak hobbling around a few days ago, mebbe its dead by now ke.' _A hunter Nid worked with a few times tho she couldn't remember his name stood up, dressed only in a fur loincloth carrying a power spear. He had a bright yellow patex as a companion like her.

_'You know why it's wounded? Not many t'ings can hurt a Karak ke.'_ Another hunter asked suspiciously. Nid was a bit suspicious herself, Karaks were large almost thirteen meters tall at times tho most were only 9, wide and muscled kind of like a warrior Tyranid trapped on four feet and was a herbivore. Unlike a lot of the smaller animals Karaks didn't have scales or exoskeletons but trusted in extra tonnes of fat, muscle and some of the toughest leather skin on the planet that most of the time required a power weapon to cut into. Fur wasn't big on this planet due to all the rain the fur would be permanently soaked and slow down whatever had it.

_'Dunno just saw it limpin round, it's down south a bit tho, not that far away from Mutabbe village ke.' _ Mutabbe was Kilik's main nemesis when it came to food, armed conflict was never need tho as they were located near many nests of creatures the main problems came when big animals like Karaks went down and both sides wanted easy food.

_'Why da pok not? If we get there 'n it's still goin strong we leave, if it dying we can wait and if Mutabbe comes along we scare em off ke?'_ Nid told the group. Unlike other places in the Imperium Kellien didn't have the rift between female and males since anyone who wanted to do the dangerous work of hunting was welcome to. The hunting group mumbled agreements and they set off.

As the group set off from the village the sun was visible through the clouds for the first time in ages. A very good omen. The hunter led them south through the hilly terrain covered in bush's, grass just couldn't get enough sunlight to live while the larger bushier plants could get the few rays that came through the canopy.

Due screeches came from Gav and the yellow patex and both started running, another distinction between patex's and wolves was apparent, wolves were a lot faster, not weighed down by chitin. The group kept up with them easily enough, they soon found that the patexs had located the path the Karak made, smashed over trees and a massive blood trail that they both must have smelled.

'_Corrr, dis is going to be a pokkin easy kill I can tell ke.' _A hunter said smiling a widely. It did seemed like it lost a lot of blood but then again...

'_You pokkin idiot Mooka's gonna gift us for you saying dat!'_ Nid growled impolitely. Mooka as god of flying idiots was said to "Gift" people with his intelligence and luck when you said something stupid.

_'Can't go invokin Mooka's name nemore it's pokkin heresy, ain't you listened to da pokkin priests.'_ The hunter responded. Swearing was very common outside of the village as it helped keep tensions low.

_'It's called a pokkin sayin idiot, got no ting to do with gods n stuff.'_ While the clergy might allow the Kellien deviation of the cult they were trying to stamp out any leftovers of the old religion with mixed results depending on how close the people were to the spaceport.

Stepping silently over a log everyone started walking lightly, an unspoken agreement to fight later as they all had heard stomping just up ahead. The lead hunter gave a signal and they all spread out, Nid found herself on the furthest end to the left as they came up to a clearing. There it was a massive Karak all grey and bulky. 11 meters if Nid had to bet. Un-slinging her lasgun she studied the thing more closely.

She saw a big tooth sticking out of its hind leg. _Must have picked a fight with a Yana_. She thought. Yana's were Kellien's apex predators next to humans. 14-16 meters tall and like the Karak covered with leather and muscle instead of chitin/scales. Standing on four legs it was kind of like a centaur out of human myths as it also had arms with three claws instead of hands. Like the Patex it had a wolfish head and mandibles. Thankfully it was like humans and was an omnivore and also thankfully unlike the Karak it wasn't aggressive as hell and took some provoking to make it go after you.

It didn't look like it was going to keel over any time soon but with that much blood coming out it shouldn't be too long. Silently crouching she started to settle in for a long wait when she heard a loud crunch next to her. Seeing the hunter from earlier standing on a broken branch she could just tell what happened.

The Karak jumped around and since not all of the hunters were properly hidden it saw them.

'_Oh pok._' The hunter that alerted it groaned.

_'You stupid pokkin Mooka._' Nid growled before the Karak let out an earth shattering roar.

_'Get pokkin runnin!'_ Quen yelled and started legging it. Not needing to be told twice Nid started sprinting with Gav right next to her. Sprinting through the jungle, easily dodging branches, pits and other dangerous obstacles an off worlder would have tripped over she tried to put as much distance between her and the rampaging Karak as she could but the roars and hoof beats seemed to be getting louder. She found herself running next to the hunter that alerted it in the first place.

_'Emperor gift you! I hope he gives you gifts that would put Mooka to shame for life! You pokkin _asshole!_' _She shouted one of the only Gothic words she knew. A large rock split them both up and she soon found her side of the rock was getting larger and curling around till she hit a dead end which meant she had to turn around. As she did turn around she saw the Karak a couple of meters ahead slowing to a trot and glaring at her with those hateful aqua eyes.

_'Oh pok me._' It stamped its feet a couple of times looking like it was about to charge. Glancing down she locked eyes with Gav. '_Any plans?'_ It looked at the Karak with his red eyes then back at her.

'Scree...' He didn't have facial expressions but Nid knew Gav thought they were pokked.

_'Emperor, boss man, it's me Nid. Sorry to botter you but I could use some help, I promise I'll make it up to you, dat guard t'ing even just let me get out of here without getting pokked.'_ Just as she finished her impromptu and probably heretical to some prayer the thing charged. Nid and Gav backed into the rock like they could meld with it if they tried enough.

Whether it was an act of random nature or the Emperor himself intervened Nid never knew but whatever it was it saved her life. As the Karak was thundering towards them a tree precariously balanced on top of the rock they were trapped by fell over and landed hard and split right in half forming an impromptu stake. When the Karak hit it easily shattered, splintering the wood even further but it did slow down to an almost stop as its weight could only take it so far. It tried roaring directly into Nid's face who responded by shoving the end of her lasgun into its mouth then letting go on fully automatic on the highest setting. As the beast fell to the floor with smoke coming out of various orifices Gav and Nid started breathing again.

Laughing shakily she looked to the sky. _'I owe ya boss._' After getting their breath back Gav and Nid started the long walk to the recruiting station.

**OoOoOoOoOoO**

Nervously tapping her data-slate commissar Victoria Albarn was the opposite of the calm collected picture most people gave to commissars. For one thing she was shorter than average only 5.2 despite being 23 years old. Her raggedy short cut black hair and open commissar greatcoat with massive sweat stains completed the look despite her intelligent green eyes. She was only half thankful of her valhallen heritage since while she was pretty much dehydrating sitting down in the descending Valkyrie she was also naturally pale white and no one would notice that she lost her colour and was sweating so much from nerves, not the heat.

The things she read in the data-slate wasn't helping her mood either. Despite the best training the schola could provide the first regiment a commissar was attached to was a nerve wrecking affair in normal situations. How the regiment faired would pretty much decide on your future career unless you did something amazing. Compounding that was the fact this was the first regiment raised from the planet, if it failed spectacularly they wouldn't raise any more unless it was an emergency and you'd go down in history as the commissar that helped make that happen. This was why experienced commissars were given these jobs which led her to the last thing that scared her.

'They haven't even been formed yet!' She yelled to herself. Six, SIX commissars dead and they hadn't even left the planet! The survival rate was even worse than Catachan regiments! At least they waited until you were in combat before blasting you in the back five of these deaths were labelled EBW whatever the frak that meant never mind the one labelled SEBW. It seems the commiserate gave up and were sending in people who wouldn't be missed just to keep up appearances.

'Calm yourself Vic, you can do this.' She breathed in slowly calming herself. Maybe this was a good thing. Cain had trained her so if she did what he suggested and avoided executions she might avoid succumbing to the mysterious EBW. Cain, the hero of the Imperium had drilled into her and the other cadet's head that a lighter hand increased respect for you and raised your survival rate.

'That's right if I just avoid them I might live through this.' She thought for a few moments before punching the sides of her head. 'Gah can't do that otherwise discipline dies!' She really didn't want to go down in history as a failure. 'Right then get them to fear me!' She thought for a few more moments before smacking herself again. 'That's how you end up EBW Vicky!' The situation seemed hopeless.

'Thirty seconds till landing commissar.' The pilot's voice came through the vox. Composing herself through years of training she put on her game face, deciding to leave plans until later, it wouldn't help if she collapsed from stress before even landing.

'Thank you.' She said in a measured tone before turning off her vox. 'Right just take it easy for a bit, see how things are then make a decision.' She told herself. She was used to speaking to herself since she was put into the schola for commissars at a young age. It helped her to think she was talking to someone else.

The engines sounded even louder for a moment before a large impact made the entire Valkyrie shake. As Victoria was rubbing feeling back into her butt the pilot's voice came through.

'We've landed, hope you enjoyed your flight.' The ramp leading outside dropped slowly and Victoria got her first view of the planet. Her first impression was wet. Rain was bucketing down and she could barely see 50 meters ahead, but she could tell the sun was out as there was light and no illuminators were out.

'How in Terra's name is it hot?' She mumbled to herself as she stood up and started walking as confidently as she could appear down the ramp. Three figures were waiting for her, she couldn't see them properly until she was closer to them. One was obviously a Cadian man, the purple eyes gave it away, a brigadier judging by the badge on his shoulders. _So the man in charge. _A woman from Valhalla and only obvious because Victoria herself was also valhallen, stood next to him. The third was a dark skinned man, she couldn't tell where he was from plenty of planets had the same features. They were all dressed in shorts and shirts definitely not looking like Guardsmen and made her feel kind of silly for insisting on wearing the commissarial greatcoat, sash and hat.

As she stepped out from underneath the Valkyrie's protective hull the rain hit her and she now knew why it was hot, the wind and water itself was hot so it wasn't cooling anything down. The Cadian stepped forward as she took off a glove to feel the water drop against it.

'Commissar Albarn?' The man asked, it was obviously just manners to ask that question even tho she couldn't be anyone else.

'The rains warm.' She idly remarked trying to seem indifferent to him, while she may have to watch her step around the natives Cain had taught her to try and build her reputation with the officers first, and the rep she wanted was not that she thought she was better than them but she was experienced and unshakeable despite coming straight from the schola and sounding like the strange hot rain and heat didn't bother her was just a few small things she wanted them to notice. The man chuckled.

'Yes commissar it does that, but at least it isn't too bad today.' Trying to keep the look of surprise off her face she finally looked at the man's face. He wasn't too bad looking, a bit of a bigger beard on him then was regulation but she supposed it would be hard to shave when you have a bunch of savages running around doing Emperor knows what.

'So what constitutes as bad on this planet?' She asked as she slid her glove back on, ignoring the squishy feeling.

'Well it once was literally falling sideways but it doesn't get that bad often, more of an extreme slant.' With her glove back on the two shook hands firmly.

'Well then want to introduce me to the crew?'

'Sure thing.' He turned slightly and waved the other two over. 'This is Colonel Catherine Andrews and Major Rajesh Shimona my second and third in command.' They took turns shaking hands.

'Pleasure to meet you.'

'Glad to see a fellow Valhallen.'

'Likewise.'

'I'd love to give you a tour but as you can see it's kind of hard to see.' His wave encompassed the thundering rain covering the landing field.

'Does it ever stop?' Again she tried to sound unconcerned but was hoping like hell inside.

'A lot of the time yes, monsoon season is actually about one fourth of the year. The polar caps are ringed by massive mountains keeping freezing temperatures due to the wind basically spinning around all the time creating a frozen vortex despite the heat of the planet. The wind almost constantly raises and gets thrown over the mountain colliding with the hot air currents and well you get this.' Another all-encompassing wave. 'But we're coming up on the part of the year where the planet will be moving away from the sun and everything should cool down a bit.'

'How long have you been here?' She asked curious as to where he gleamed this knowledge since it wasn't in her briefing notes. He chuckled.

'Three years and I'll tell you right now commissar your briefing notes are useless.' Victoria kept the stunned expression off her face, wondering how he saw through her so easily.

'Mine weren't either.' he continued, _Oh good he couldn't read me. _'This planet is, pardon my language but it's in the ass end of nowhere any information the administration has given you is probably from a report hastily written years ago since this planet doesn't have much worth to send proper teams.'

'Well then when could you spare time for a tour?'

'It's actually set to start clearing up tomorrow I'll have the Colonel give you the tour and if you don't mind give you some tips as there is a lot you will need to know if wish to survive.' Victoria gave a wry smile.

'Sending her just because she's another women?'

'No I'm sending her since you're both from Valhalla.' _That makes more sense._

'Right now tho Major Rajesh will show you to a room we've put aside for you.' As they all turned to leave Victoria stopped the Brigadier.

'Brigadier, a word please.'

'Yes?' The other two failed to hide impatience at being kept in the rain. Victoria motioned for him to lean in and she whispered in his ear.

'The previous commissars were marked as killed by EBW, what does that mean?' She decided to ask the question most pressing on her mind. She wasn't reassured as Julius grinned evilly then whispered in her ear.

'Eaten by wildlife.' The Brigadier laughed as he strolled off, mainly at the fact Victoria had no control over the horrified expression that covered her face. The walk from the spaceport to the Guard compound was extremely quick Victoria found, mainly due to the fact that Imperial civilisation on Kellien was located solely around it and was barely even a town compared to other planets.

The rain did pick up and soon enough she had to actually hold onto the major so she wouldn't lose her way since visibility was just that bad. Soaking wet and still feeling like she was boiling in her skin they stepped underneath an extra-large gutter attached to a building.

'By the throne!' She exclaimed, disregarding the experienced commissar rep she was trying to build while wringing water from her hat. The major was doing something similar with his.

'I wouldn't worry too much commissar it doesn't get this bad often.'

'How did you find this place anyway I thought we were lost for a while.' The major waved a map around.

'Always carry one with you ma'am.'

'I'll keep that in mind.'

'Anyway I've got to get back to Julius.' She raised an eyebrow at how casual he dropped his commanding officers name. 'Another thing you'll learn is that discipline amongst us Imperials is a lot lower than other regiments. The Kelliens don't really care how we suffer since its all par for the course for them. So we gotta stick together.'

'Well I've just got here so I'll let it slide for now.' Realising just how much work she would have to do she inwardly sighed. Commissars were always outsiders in the regiments they were assigned to, they needed to be if they were going to hand out impartial punishments. But something told her a lot of what she learned at the schola wouldn't help her here.

After saying goodbye the new commissar stepped into her room and sighed in relief as a blast of ice cold air hit her, she found out later that their rooms were literally hooked up to an industrial grade freezer that held some of the food for the regiment. Her room wasn't much, single bed, desk, chair and a wardrobe but she guessed it was a lot more spacious then other peoples.

Placing her chain-sword and laspistol on the desk she flopped on her bed unsure of what to do. She had to find an office and start letting everyone know where she was, she had to start making the rounds and make sure people knew she was around and multiple other things but none of that would matter if she was murdered.

'Why me...' She groaned. She started reading through the data-slate for what seemed like the hundredth time, trying to will an answer out of it. Cain had taught her class that while most briefing slates weren't worth the time to read them a quick glance over was always a good thing, and if you were well and truly stuck something may just jump out of it with a thorough examination.

'Planet, history, topography, geography...' She glanced through them sure that none of it would help her.

'Religion...' She thought for a moment about tying the emperors wrath to her getting shot but that was out of line so she crushed the thought.

'Sociology.' It stated what she already knew, they were a bunch of backwards tribals some still nomadic. Then something caught her eye. It was a pie chart of death.

_40% of Kellien deaths per village are from wildlife, 30% from disease, 10% from hunger, 10% from other 8% unknown 2% murder/execution/native interference._ So that explained why they were so hostile to commissars that pulled out that card. She supposed it made sense, tribes weren't big and you couldn't be killing one whenever they pissed you off, hell there wasn't a percentage for internal conflict so they must avoid attacking other tribes as well. Killing someone seems like the last solution on this planet.

'So how do the chiefs enforce the rules...?' She placed the slate on her head and closed her eyes thinking hard. No society could work without some law, even if it wasn't called that. Mutual co-operation could only get you so far. The chiefs would have their strongmen to scare the others into line as well as be well respected.

'Respect...' Saying the one word out loud brought it to the front of her focus. There were multiple ways to get respect, bravery, balanced policies, being liked, skills. She was good with her chain-sword and pistol but she doubted she could actually match these people who spent most of their life using melee weapons and long ranged weapons. So skills were out, she couldn't prove her bravery really well unless she was in battle or helped with hunting, she didn't have time for hunting and she'd only make a fool of herself anyway.

'Fear...' Respect was out until later she realised so maybe fear wasn't out of the cards. She knew she couldn't shoot anyone that much was obvious, but how would the chiefs make the people under them fear them. Yelling, screaming and making loud noises were obvious. If the chief wanted to get a lazy hunter off their ass they'd definitely yell at them first and if said imaginary hunter still didn't do anything the chief would kick them in the guts.

She blinked.

'It couldn't be...' She sat up ramrod straight. 'It can't be so easy.' She flicked through the slate looking for videos, any in which the natives were smacking each other around and she was mildly shocked. It looked from a distance that the natives based their society mildly on the orks, whenever someone had a problem with another a quick smack from the other solved it, if the other person smacked back a third person, one of the strongmen would hit them both.

'Just avoid the more... symbolic forms of punishment like lashings and I think I've got a plan.' She smiled evilly to herself. She made a mental note to thank Cain for teaching her to be more unorthodox when it came to the rules.

**OoOoOoOoOo**

'Get moving you lazy frakkers! Last one there gets the taste of Nehgron!' The sudden yelling made sergeant Gunter Heinrich shoot up from out of his sleep and smash his head on a low lying panel. Falling back down in his seat he swore loudly.

"MUTTER FRAKKER!' Clasping his damaged head in pain he kept on swearing until the pain dulled. He was currently sleeping in the regiments only Leman Russ main battle tank since he could crank on the air-con and leave it all night while he slept, which was why he was currently only wearing his pants and boots, dull grey from his home planet of Krieg.

'You okay boss man ke?' A male voice from outside the tank filled with worry. Wiping his forehead his hand came away with blood he kicked a nearby panel in frustration before calming down.

'I'm right.' Getting up more slowly this time he opened up the hatch leading to the outside, the nice cold interior was suddenly blasted with hot air. Standing up he looked around the field they were parked in. Around him were two chimeras, the other two the regiment had were inside a large building to his left. The Kellien 1st looked like it wasn't going to fit strictly into the light infantry regiment category due to its slapped together nature. While mainly composed of light troops a chimera would follow each company to transmit orders to each platoon. Gunter's job... well when the enemy was completely sure they were only fighting light infantry hopefully his arrival would give them one right between the eyes.

To his right stood two Kelliens, one male the other female his driver and gunner respectively.

Nogo Sejeni his driver was a native of the planet, grew up around Imperials and had no pet, it died a while back and Kelliens didn't believe in replacements. Being a Kellien that could use technology and owning no pet made him a minority and consequently one of the only people on the planet that could drive a tank. He had green eyes, was shaved bold and covered in muscles. His hazelnut skin was darker then Gunters tan.

Pita Sejeni was his gunner and Nogo's twin sister so sported the same green eyes, muscles and skin. She had a head full of black hair tho and obvious female bits. Both were wearing Krieg tanker clothing, a present from Gunter since he honestly liked the two, unlike Nogo tho she did have an animal companion, a snake which was amazingly just like any other snake in the galaxy, long slithery, fangs full of poison except it was green in colour.

Gunter himself was not your average Krieg, he used to be. Not born from the "iron mother" aka cloning vat he was purely human born, with a strong since of duty and a solemn outlook on life when he joined the a Krieg armoured battalion at 16 years of age he was happy to serve. A lot had happened over 17 years. After multiple mess ups from those in charge and more than one deployment with Catachans he had an absolute distrust and hatred for authority and had been charged with insubordination multiple times. The only reason he wasn't shot was because he was a damn good tank commander.

During his last deployment what was left of his battalion got wiped out by the Tau in an ill devised scheme from a commissar and over ambitious lieutenant. His tank barely made it out, his driver and gunner dead and he was missing his right arm from the elbow down. Not knowing what to do with a crippled Kriegien and his patchwork tank he was assigned to Kellien to train the drivers of the command vehicles another mess up from the administratem as before his arrival it was purely light infantry. He was one of the first personnel on the planet, the other being Julius Hethrodge.

Julius and Gunter didn't get along very well at the beginning, Gunter still scarred from his experiences with command making any sort of co-operation strenuous as best. They soon came up with a suitable compromise, Gunter could do whatever the hell he wanted as long as his crews knew to listen to Julius when push came to shove and he didn't act like too much of an ass.

Gunter after 2 years on the planet was no longer pale from lack of sunlight but had a deep tan, not as good as the natives but still impressive, it went well with his bald head and brown eyes. He still had some uniform from his Krieg days and still used it when he had to dress fancy but generally just wore boots and pants with his gasmask clipped to his utility belt a comforting weight from his time back home. He was pretty skinny but still had some muscles which gave him a wirery appearance.

'Heard ya yelling boss.' That was Pita. Lighting up a cigarette with his cybernetic hand Gunter looked around and saw what woke him.

'She's frakking at it again.' The twins started laughing.

'Yea she smart one boss, figured out dat in no time ke.' Gunter grunted in response. The new commissar was chasing a bunch of Kelliens around the field, waving her extendible baton dubbed "Nehgron" by the natives and hitting anyone she caught up with. Gunter was willing to give her grudging respect like he did with Julius, both were smart enough, she figured out all you had to do was give them a hiding and that was that none of that skak ritual punishment or executions the commiserate was so fond of.

'I lost 30 creds.' He mumbled last he heard the woman herself collected the winnings. He didn't complain about it much, no one had bet over three weeks and here she was a month later and still kicking.

'I SAID MOVE IT!' Well screaming at least.

'She's a regular Nehg.' Pita said, her brother nodding in agreement. While Pita managed better with Imperial, getting the Th noises and dropping the ke her brother wasn't as proficient. If he was a religious person he would have busted them for referring to their heathen god... if. He did believe in the emperor and all that but he was infected with the Kellien theory of not bothering him. Taking a long drag he blew it out a moment later.

'She's an angry bitch, a smart angry bitch I spose.' He shook his head. He'd have to close the hatch soon if he wanted it to still be cold. Jumping out of the tank he shut the hatch then jumped to the floor.

'What's the plan today?' Both of them looked at him, excitement gleaming in their eyes. They were probably the only natives in thousands of years to break running speed he thought.

'Nothing good I hate to say, I'm going to have to train a new driver for 4th company's chimera.'

'What why ke?' Groaning theatricality he started.

'Someone!' Puff of cigarette. 'Thought it'd be a smart idea to try and bribe the machine spirit to go faster.' Exhaling he pointed to the vehicle bay. 'Took one of the chimeras out for a joyride, when he got back Janet.' Their regimental tech priest. 'Lost her skak, she's not going to let him near the machine again so I've got to spend the better part of today with the psycho.' If he was paying attention he would have seen the twins straighten up. 'Teaching some frakhead the proper rituals and invocations then start driving school all over again!' Finishing his tirade he had another puff, a que for one of the two to start joking like they always did. They didn't, he realised they were looking over his shoulder.

'She's behind me ain't she.' nods. 'Frak.' Spinning around he plastered his biggest skak eating grin on his face. 'Janet lovely to see you.' The tech priest was not amused. Just like the Imperial cult the Mechanicus has deviating lines of faith as well, any normal tech priest wouldn't last long as the 1sts tech priest because to the normal tech priest they were almost heretically rude to their machine spirits. Janet being a low level priest and young was ideal for the new regiment since she wasn't too entrenched in the mechanicus ideals and wasn't too heavily augmented, apparently one thing that scares a Kellien is a heavily augmented priest.

So Janet Tressborn was assigned to the 1st. While being 24 years old and of average height she looked taller because of two mechanical arms coming out of her back, a prehensile tail kept her from falling over. She would have been a pretty good looking women as she had long flowing red hair, and an emerald green eye but the big red fake one that replaced her left eye ruined that for many. She hid under the bulky white and red robes of her calling so it was impossible to tell her figure.

Right now she was tapping her foot, arms crossed and a scowl on her face, a perfect look of irritation radiated from her body.

'You think I want to go through the same things as you?' Knowing he was up skak creek without a paddle Gunter decided to go the easy route.

'No ma'am.'

'Do you think joyriding and abusing the machine spirit is a joke.'

'No ma'am.'

'Damn right you don't! So where do you find the gall to stand there and ridicule my decision to replace that frakker!'

'My apologies ma'am.'

'Stop ma'aming me!'

'Sorry ma'am.' After another couple of minutes of being ripped into Janet finally stormed off leaving Gunter and two sniggering natives. He glared at them.

'Shut up unless you want to go the way of your cousin Obo.' They both snapped of sarcastic salutes.

'Yes sergeant.'

'You know what I think the Tank spirit is feeling the heat, maybe you both should give it a wash.'

**OoOoOoOoOo**

Nideen, recruit in the Imperial Guards 1st Kellien regiment was bored. The training was nothing like what she expected. 3 weeks of learning nothing but low Gothic, another couple of how to take care of uniforms and discipline, it seems the mooka's knew that physical training was pretty much useless. Now she was in a section spread out in the jungle carefully walking through, trying to ambush another squad they were having war-games against. Each person's animal companions were close by, also silent.

While every trooper had a dress uniform back at base the field uniforms they wore were modified to suit each Kellien much to the chagrin on those in charge. She had her normal boots and pants on but had torn the sleeves off her shirt and undone all the buttons down the front, buckling the bottom together so it wouldn't flap around uselessly with a green singlet underneath.

Her squad consisted of 6 people including herself. Quen who surprisingly decided to join up with her. A man from far north called Gat, apparently it did something called "Snow" up where he was from, she thought he was lying about that as he said ice basically fell from the sky. She hadn't seen ice till she was told to empty a freezer in the guard compound so she doubted it could call from the sky. The man was paler then normal tho so he might not be lying. He had a snake coiled around his waist. Gat didn't talk... at all unless he absolutely had to, so she couldn't get a proper read on him but he did come off a bit standoffish.

Berren apparently was from Kilik village as well, he had brown hair and eyes tho so maybe she missed him, he had a patex next to him. He was an alright sort not anyone Nid would hang around with more due to the fact he was also quiet and didn't talk much.

Jita was a women that lived near the spaceport so was the most fluent in Gothic out of all of them, she used to have aqua hair to match her eyes but like the rest of them it was changed to black. Her pet died a while ago apparently so she was by herself, maybe because of this she was the most talkative out of the group next to Nideen and the two got along well.

Last but not least was their corporal another woman named Kinna she was a lot darker than the rest of them, it seems the entire planet wasn't covered in jungle, she was from the rare bits of grassland on the other side of the planet, on another continent. Her eyes were silver and she had a pokkin Karak called Brunt as a companion, understandably it was back at base since this was stealth exercise. She was well respected amongst her squad, she was tough but fair and as having a Karak as a companion she was brave, rumour was she had to take down the mother Karak before she could take the baby, and Nid having hunted them before knew all too well how much courage that took.

'Scree.' Gav was pouting next to her, he still wasn't happy at being spray painted lime green. In an effort to remove colour from the Kelliens to enforce discipline and make them harder to spot on other planets all hair colours on the people that weren't a variant on more standard human colours were changed to one of those while the animals were all painted to match whatever colour the vehicles were so currently lime green. Nid had painted an 1st on Gavs shoulder in an attempt to cheer him up but he was still pretty miffed.

'Can't do anyt'ing.' She shrugged. They were punished whenever they spoke Kellien in an effort to make them learn Gothic better. She was pretty good at it, managing to drop the ke and spoke fluently, she just couldn't wrap her tongue around the Th's tho.

'Shut up.' Gat whispered harshly to her, she was second to the front so they were in the lead.

'Oh c'mon Gat dis whole t'ings a pokkin joke.' Not wanting to risk a trooper shooting another one they were all given dud guns and told to yell bang when they were firing, the Lieutenant and two sergeants would then yell the name of whoever was hit and you'd have to lie down and pretend to be dead, it was all in all an adult game of guardsmen.

Grunting Gat conceded the point to her, even the silent man could see how ridiculous this was. As the day dragged on their section had one of the ridiculous fights when they ambushed 4th section in their platoon. No one "died" so they spent another few hours crawling through the jungle carefully until they came across a clearing. Their sergeant a fairly nice man named Junt was resting against a tree with their Lt another man, an off worlder called William. It was universally agreed William was way too serious about his job and the natives took pleasure in annoying him.

Berren waved the signal to the section to stop and they all gathered around. Kinna spoke first.

'Well it's obvious t'ere's anot'ter section around here.' They all nodded in agreement those two wouldn't be hanging around for nothing.

'Anyone got a plan ke?' Asked Berren.

'Charge in single file screaming at ta top our lungs?' The entire section was silent, staring at Gat as he finished his joke. The man really didn't talk much.

'Seems good to me.' Quen responded, idly rolling a rock around with his hand.

'We can't do that, we'll probably have to deal with little Nehg.' Nid unconsciously shivered at Jita's mention of the angry little woman. The "commissar" whatever that meant had given all of them at least a single smack with her baton and it stung for ages. Though to be fair everyone she has hit deserved it. Nid supposed everyone was used to treating off worlders as just that. Through her many baton smacks and yelling she had gotten all of them behaving like guardsmen... most of the time and not tribals with guns, they still joked around and did stupid stuff but the rampant ignoring of orders was definitely gone.

'So any good plans?' Berren asked again.

'Scout round the edges, splitting up three round one way three round the other.' Kinna told them.

'Pok tis farce.' Nid stood up and strolled out into the middle of the clearing, Gav trotting alongside. The two men in the clearing stood up ready and alert.

'Get back here!' Quen whispered harshly but Nideen didn't even look back and just kept walking. She found a nice and sunny place covered in grass where the canopy didn't shroud it in permanent shadow. After kicking a few rocks out of the way she made sure it was nice and clear before looking directly at the lieutenant, one of the people who planned this retarded exercise.

'What's that Gav you stood on a landmine?' She said loudly enough that everyone near the clearing could have heard. Gav, catching her meaning acted on it.

'Scree!' Loudly he made another screech then threw himself against the floor pretending to be dead. Nid fell to her knees, carefully near the empty patch she made.

'Nooooo!' She yelled while throwing her arms up and screaming at the sky. 'I don't want to live!' She put the fake gun to her head and then yelled 'BANG!' Before flopping down next to Gav. Snickering and giggling was heard from all around the clearing.

'Recruit Jesner!' The lieutenant stomped over to her with a sergeant barely keeping a straight face. Standing right over her he yelled 'Get up right now!'

'I can't hear you sir I'm dead.'

'Scree.' Nid was willing to bet 20 creds the Lt was shaking in anger and red in the face. From across the clearing her section came strolling out from cover all before dropping to various poses of over exaggerated grief.

'Nideen nooo! She was so young!' Kinna yelled, various yells of bang and bodies hitting the floor told her they were deciding to follow her plan.

'All of you stop this right now!' William yelled, the stomping told her he was going to them. Some more yelling on the other side caught her attention.

'Section one noooo! It was just a game! BANG!' More sounds of people throwing themselves against the floor.

'ENOUGH!' The LT was now marching over to whichever section decided to join in on their mass "suicide".

'Section three nooo! I was in love with corporal Nix now he will never know my feelings!' Another voice this time from the east, it sounded like the entire platoon was around here!

'Don't be gay!' It was the same voice that lamented section ones loss.

'You're supposed to be dead!' The lover voice yelled back.

'Oh right, blaaaaagh!'

'Noooo! BANG!' that little play set the entire field of "corpses" off laughing.

'That is it! I'm reporting you all to the commissar! She'll have you shot!' The shear rage in his voice made Nid laugh even louder.

'She's smarter then you ya pokkin mooka!' She didn't recognise that voice.

'Who said that!' the indignant Lt sounded like he was about to explode.

'Pok off!' Another voice, there was a loud ting noise as someone had thrown a tin at the man's head.

'GOOOH I'll see you all hang!' With that the officer stormed off with laughing sergeant in tow. Two loud thumps on either side of her signalled company. She looked at them quickly seeing Quen and Jita on either side.

'We're going to get in a lot of trouble for this.' Quen said.

'Especially because of that idiot who threw the tin.' Jita continued Quen's sentence. Nid shrugged while enjoying the sun.

'What's the worst that could happen?'

**OoOoOoOoOoO**

Lying on the cold hard gravel that was 2nd platoons parade ground was 2nd platoon, well most of them. With a quick series of strikes, one in the left leg, one in the arm, one in the stomach, one in the chest and one across the face Victoria Albarn put the last of them on the ground writhing in pain.

'Get up you frakking skakkers! On your feet unless you want another one!' She yelled at the pile of men and women. Groaning and complaining most of them stumbled to their feet, a quick crack with her baton got the couple of stragglers up. After finding out about 2nd platoons little stunt she gathered them all on the parade ground and told them just what she was going to. The commissar with her baton, it was kind of like a radio antenna but thicker and collapsible, hit every single one of them five times, ten for the idiots that swore at the admittedly stupid LT, 15 for the moron who ditched a tin can at him and 20 for the initiator.

The LT's little war-game was stupid in Victoria's opinion, who in their right minds would organise such a ridiculous game. But as Imperial Guards they had the duty to follow whatever the moron said and it was Victoria's job to enforce discipline. She would have words with Lieutenant William later for being such an idiot but that was for later.

'Attention!' She called out, a few of them responded to the command and assumed the attention position but many were still doubling over or crouching.

'I said attention!' She slammed her baton against the arm of some random. It had the desired effect with the rest straightening up. She started pacing in front of them glaring each one of them in the eye. She passed the Lt who was the cause of this, he had a skak eating grin on his face, she smiled darkly inside he wouldn't have that much longer.

'I hope you all remember something here today. I don't want you to remember that I will personally beat you down if I have something like this happen again.' She passed a dark skinned, black haired and red eyed woman, the instigator of the "nap" war. She flinched which made Victoria smile. Nideen if she remembered the name correctly had a bruised cheek and a cut across her forehead.

'I don't want you to remember what happens when you disobey lawful commands from your superior.' She reached the end of the platoon and spun around. 'Those two things should be instinctual, something that happens subconsciously, something that doesn't require you to rub two brain cells together because you will know in the bottom of your gut what the outcome will be, like how you know day turns into night and night into day.' She stopped in the middle and looked directly at the man in front of her. She then looked around and saw all of them doing their best to look straight ahead.

'Look at me all of you, look me in the eye.' All the heads turned, she made sure she had eye contact with all of them. 'What I want you to remember is this, if this was anywhere else you'd all be shot.' She let that sink in. 'Sure so far if a commissar tried to kill you, you killed them back, its only self-defence that's fair, I get that.' She looked across the men and woman making sure they were still paying attention.

'Outside of this planet tho, you try shooting a commissar you don't like, an officer you thinks stupid the general a man with the authority over hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of soldiers will ask for your head, and while you may stand a chance here against a single officer... a single commissar. You won't have a chance against an army. That's what I want you to remember.' A wave of relief washed through he as she saw most of them nodding without realising it. A sudden clap of her hands brought them all back to the proper attention position.

'Right then, everyone except recruit Nideen Jesner dismissed!' The platoon saluted, turned and marched off, all except a very nervous looking Nideen.

'Right then follow me.' As they both entered Victoria's office she closed the door and offered Nideen a seat.

'Cheers little Nehg.' Victoria was curious as to what she meant by that, all of the natives have taken to calling her little Nehg instead of Commissar and called her baton Nehgron, she was sure it wasn't an insult they weren't that stupid but it left her curious all the same. Well the entire point of this little meeting was to find out about it while she had the native good and scared.

'I didn't want to say this out there but I may have been a bit... overzealous when it came to your punishment, you feeling all right.' It was actually true, her baton was a blunt instrument and when she drew blood from the native woman's face she scaled back a bit on the power when moving onto the next. In all honesty the system of punishment she had devised on Kellien was a lot better in her opinion, Cain was right when he told them executions were a last resort as you were more likely to get a hole in the back during battles and you deprived yourself of a fully trained soldier.

Rubbing her ribs Nideen spoke. 'I'll live, you got a good couple hits in dere boss.' She gave a strained and half-hearted chuckle. Victoria sat down in her chair and leaned back after throwing her feet up on the table.

'Good, I'm glad, now as you're aware I'm no priest.' Another half chuckle. 'But I am a bit worried as to this... Nehg you keep referring to me as, care to explain?' A couple of surprised blinks told Victoria that Nideen wasn't expecting that question. Rubbing the back of her head the woman looked a bit bashful.

'Uh, you know how Mooka's de god of bad luck, stupid people and sickness?' Victoria wasn't actually aware of that last connotation, it must not be as widely used.

'Yes I am.' She nodded, motioning for her to proceed.

'Well Nehg, full name Nehganar is anot'ter old god, god of rage, anger and hitting tings. Nehgron was his favoured weapon a mace he used, da same mace was said to of made Mooka da idiot he was.' Victoria felt an icy pit in her stomach. It wasn't a wildly known fact, a fact Victoria wouldn't have even known if not for some special lessons from Cain but the great enemy chaos wasn't a single entity. It was four distinct gods of power, Nurgle of sickness sounded suspiciously like Mooka while this Nehganar sounded like the god of bloodshed Khorn. All this was running through her head and she felt sick.

This entire planet could be infected by chaos, no one bothered to learn in depth about their old gods. Swallowing the bile that threatened to jump out of her she steadied her voice for her next question.

'Any other gods I should... know about?'

'Bout two more.' The icy pit grew bigger.

'C... c...' _Steady down Vic._ She told herself. 'Tell me about them.' Nideen shrugged, obviously not caring now she knew she wasn't in further trouble.

'You've got Halatix the god of art, music and da like, all his leftovers is in da forbidden valley doe so no one's seen it in ages. Last off you've got Jraden god of smarts, magic and da like.' She laughed a bit. 'No one else knew how to trough lightning round so dat's half da reason we thought ta priests were gods when dey did ta same.' Victoria's heart was beating like never before, Tzeetch and Slannesh the whole four of them. She had to tell someone.

'Uh... uh... scuse me for a moment.' With that the commissar bolted from the room leaving a confused Nideen.

**OoOoOoOoOoO**

'WHY AM I JUST LEARNING THIS NOW?' Julius hurled a slate at the screen which was transmitting to the nearest Administratem planet.

'We couldn't have known, you know how many gods new worlds have when we first find them? Some-'

'Don't give me that bullskak!' Julius cut off the balding clerk. Two hours ago their new commissar had come running to him ranting and raving about chaos, it took a bit for him and Catherine who were having dinner at the time to calm her down but as soon as she could explain properly they'd been running around non-stop. CHAOS! The great enemy might be on this planet and no one would of known, the entire population could have been worshipping chaos and they'd never of known. A shiver went down his spine when he thought what a traitor regiment could have done.

'Brigadier calm down you haven't even confirmed if there even is a chaos presence on the planet yet.'

'Now listen here y-.' Julius caught himself, they hadn't actually confirmed it yet, all they had was a few eerily similar tribal tales. 'I'll be back.' He cut the transmission and spun around coming face to face with his upper command and commissar.

'He does make a good point.' Rajesh said thoughtfully.

'No offence commissar but all we do have is some stories.' Catherine was looking down to Victoria, she was a full head taller after all.

'I know that, I didn't expect all this.' She waved her hand around. 'I just thought we should launch an investigation immediately.'

'True, but how do we go about this all we've got is some folk lore.' Julius pointed out the obvious.

'Did you idiots even listen to what she said?' A familiar Kriegien voice made Julius flinch. Julius made many concessions to Sergeant Gunter, the man had trust issues and was likely the only experienced armoured commander they were likely to get, but there had to be limits.

'Sergeant watch yourself.' Turning his head Julius glared at the man, wearing only his boots and pants he stuck out amongst even the lightly dressed commanders. After a brief moment Gunter raised his arms like he was surrendering.

'I apologise that was too far... sir.'

'May I ask who this is?' Victoria asked. Sighing Julius pointed towards the man.

'Commissar this is Sergeant Gunter Heinrich, he has a bad attitude and probably deserves more than one kick in the ass but there's reasons and I'd ask you take it easy on him for a while until you learn more.' There was a tense moment. While she may hold her executions off the natives for self-preservation she didn't have to show the same concern for the off worlders. After studying him for moment she reached a decision.

'Bread and water for a week.'

'Bread and water! Why don't you-' the sergeant was going red but he stopped himself. He was pointing a finger directly at the commissar who just stood there watching it indifferently. Julius had to admit she was a good commissar.

'Why don't I what?' She asked. He visibly calmed down before lowering the offending appendage.

'Nothing commissar.'

'I believe you were about to say why don't I make it two weeks as an example to others?' Julius was now holding his breath as it seemed the sergeant was about to leap at her, he was a useful man but usefulness had its limits, and thinking about limits the commissar was pushing them as well. Another few tense seconds and he deflated again.

'That's exactly what I was going to say.' Victoria nodded cheerfully now that she had her way.

'So what did you come here to say anyway?' Julius asked, taking the conversation back on track.

'I overheard the commissar when she was explaining things to you the first time. Seems to me one of these "old gods"' Gunter made the apostrophes with his fingers, he obviously didn't put much stock into these gods like a proper Imperial citizen. 'Had a place in the forbidden valley, I happen to know for a fact that there's a place that the natives refuse to go so who wants to bet something is around there?' Everyone thought on his words for a bit. Catherine was the first to speak.

'So we send out a little expedition to this valley and see if can find proof of chaos worship.' Julius was the only person who didn't flinch at the casual dropping of the great enemies name, he was Cadian after all the enemy feared him. 'If we don't find proof all's good and we just drop in a report with the clergy, if we do find proof we call the inquisition immediately.'

'Sounds good to me.' Rajesh answered.

'Alright Gunter do you reckon we can drive there or airborne only? I want this done fast so walking is out of the question.' Julius switched into planning mode.

'Sir the grounds just too skakked, it's too frakking wet too frakking moveable and the trees too frakking close, the only driving practise my crews get is when the spaceport ain't being used.'

'Alright airborne it is, Catherine how many Valkyries do we have?'

'We aren't a proper mechanical regiment so only two the rest are proper transports which require more area to land.' Julius nodded.

'Commissar you're going to be needed from what you told us Cain taught you about chaos well, I need you to lead a squad, off worlders only the natives aren't to be trusted, to this valley.'

'Good idea, we've mainly got officers and clerks tho, officers taking orders from each other and clerks I do sense a problem. Not going to be fun.' She responded. That was true while Kellien command may be more lax then normal there was still jostling for promotions.

'That's alright the squad will be Gunter's choice he can form the rest by himself and lead it with Commissar Victoria in charge.' He looked to the angry bald man who seemed a bit surprised at being chosen given his fairly recent chewing out by the commissar. Julius knew that and wanted him to work with the commissar, they both had to work together and he wanted Victoria to see his good side not just his bad before they left the planet.

'Acceptable, I'll even drop the second week if this goes well.' It seems the commissar knew exactly what he was doing and was willing to try and leave room for the sergeant to get into her good graces.

'Fair nuff, Janet as much as I say I dislike her I don't, she'll be great for this mission and she can bring two of her subordinates while I'll bring my two trainees.' Julius frowned.

'Aren't your trainees natives, I thought I just said no natives.'

'I know what you're saying but these two are good trust me and they aren't superstitious either so they'll follow us to the valley. Besides even if they do betray and kill us you can just bomb the planet anyway when we don't return.'

'Alright we've got a plan, move it.'

**OoOoOoOoOoO**

Leaning out of the Valkyries side door holding onto a handle to make sure she didn't fall commissar Victoria felt for the first time since she arrived on this planet a cool breeze. It seems the jungle canopy helped keep the high temperatures roiling around underneath them while up above it was in the low 30's not 50's. Looking back into ship she gave a glance at the squad she was leading.

Gunter, she wasn't sure what to think about him personally yet, professionally he had so far only proven to be a pain in the ass but some people just weren't good at first impressions. At least he was wearing a singlet now. He glanced up at her before going back to making sure his scatter lasgun was working. It seems the sergeant had his own personal weapon, normally a lasgun just fired through a single focal point but his had multiple making it sort of like a las shotgun spread at the expense of raw power. She wasn't worried about a shot in the back, while the sergeant was an ass he was a loyal soldier of the Imperium and a Kriegien at that.

To the side of him were two excited natives chattering away, twins by the look of them. Both were cradling lasguns while pointing out at the passing scenery, they were probably the first natives to fly like this. She noted they were both wearing Kriegien uniforms which surprised her, it seems the sergeant had a soft spot for these two.

On the other side was a different trio, a lot quieter for one. The tech-priest Janet dressed in her normal priestly robes, her mechanical arms were holding a bolter just in front of her while her human hands cleaned it in minute detail. When she had brought along the massive weapon Victoria was a bit sceptical as only Astarte's could carry the weapons and they were genetically engineered super humans power armour. The priest had assured her while she couldn't run and gun with it, she could aim properly with her mechanical arms and eye targeting while her tail would keep her from falling over. On either side of her were two corporals that helped her carry heavy things around and helped her with her rituals.

'We're coming up on the valley commissar, I can already see a large clearing from here.' The pilot's voice came from her vox.

'Take us down, don't land until I pick out a spot.' She replied. Leaning back out she watched as the landscape gave sped past.

'What the...' She whispered to herself. Smack bang in the middle of the clearing was undeniably a small scale imperial city, the city itself had a sort of deep circular moat going all the way around it, presumably to stop the jungle from growing into the city. 'Pilot can you identify any of those buildings?'

The Valkyrie flew just over the tallest building and started circling. The building themselves looked really old, some having decayed into rubble while others stood, not proud but slumping over slightly. She could spot an area where a statue might of stood once or a place a gargoyle once watched over the long gone populous but they had long since lost any form, most likely due to severe natural decay.

'Can't tell much commissar, I think that's the head government building at the south side, it's certainly larger than the others.'

'Commissar over 'ere.' Heinrich waved her over to his side of the door. They were passing through the south side so she would have had to anyway to keep the city in sight.

'What do you see sergeant?' She asked while crouching next to him, he responded by pointing, following his finger she saw the Krieg borne was pointing at a building directly in the centre.

'That looks a bit like a church don't it?' A single building stood in the middle of a wide open and circular courtyard. It was missing the roof and windows but the stone structure itself indeed match the silhouette of a church.

'Pilot land us in the courtyard if there's any chaos around here they would of defaced that building first.'

'Roger that.' As the Valkyrie landed Victoria was worried that the buildings wouldn't be able to stand the sudden force but it seems the structures had survived more ferocious weather and challenges. The squad leapt from the ship and fanned out in military order weapons raised ready for trouble, except Victoria and Janet who calmed walked towards the church.

'Looks like it was burned.' Janet mused, At first the commissar didn't know what the other woman was talking about but a quick inspection of the leftover stonework revealed it had sort of melded together over emperor knows how many years.

'Got an estimate of when this place was built?' As far as she knew there hadn't ever been an imperial presence on this planet until 200 years ago which begged the question of what this city was doing here. Janet stroked the wall and studied it for a while. Victoria realised this wasn't going to be an instant estimate. 'Sergeant want to scout out the inside?' She phrased it as a question even tho it was most assuredly an order.

'Yes commissar.' He ground out before the signalling the rest of the soldiers to follow him. After another minute of awkward silence Janet spoke out.

'It's pre-heresy I think.' Victoria's mind boggled at how long that must have been.

'That's over 10 000 years old!' Janet stepped back and gave the structure a look of new-found respect.

'The Imperium builds things to last.' As Victoria was still wrapping her mind around this last revelation she heard yelling.

'Commissar come look at this!' It was the sergeant. The two woman trotted inside, mercifully the place was free of chaotic markings, albeit devoid of markings of the imperial cult as well. In fact on the inside nothing hinted at it being a church, the only reason they thought it was one was because of the structures general look. At the other side of the room there were the rest of the squad huddling around something.

'Report.'

'See for yourself.' Everyone stepped back revealing a set of stairs leading down into almost pure darkness, light simply could not reach the bottom of them.

'Well let's see where it goes.' Taking the lead for looks more than anything Victoria flipped on her illuminator and started a long trek down the stairs. She lost track of just how many stairs she went down or the time she was taking, she did note the stairs were much larger than normal, and the ceiling higher than a normal human would need. After an unknown amount of time which passed in silence except the patter of boots the squad reached a big metal door sealed shut.

'Janet can you get this open?' The priest stepped forward and looked at it for just a moment before speaking.

'Easily, the spirit is old, ages old but it seems to of remembered its duty.' She couldn't hear just what the woman mumbled after that, probably a word of thanks for working so long before the doors slid open, a sudden flash of light blinded her for a moment before her vision came back.

Stepping out from the stairwell she was treated to a truly massive room, it must have been buried underneath the building. And what she saw next was nothing but awe inspiring. In the far end of the room was none other than a gray thunder hawk it looked battered and many dents had warped the metal, she saw a yellow heraldry with a wolf head on the front on the side of it. Just in front of it was a throne, Victoria scared herself for a moment thinking the figure was still alive but she was wrong as a Astarte's set of armour sat in it.

On the left side in rows leading up to it were three tombs, she didn't recognise what was written on it but she could tell whoever made it had cared deeply for the dead, space marine dead judging by the sheer size and by the fact on the other side three more sets of space marine armour lined the way, standing vigil over the fallen. They were all painted the same way as the thunder hawk and also shared the same badge which Victoria belatedly realised belonged to the space wolf chapter.

'By the holy throne.' One of the minions Janet brought along whispered, another late realisation from Victoria was she was making the sign of the Aquila.

'The old gods are real.' She heard the female twin whisper.

'It's a space marine tomb.' Even the angry sergeant sounded awed by their finding.

'I can't believe the machine spirits are still running, truly their loyalty knows no bounds.' The commissar wasn't surprised by the tech-priest being more amazed by the technology than the dead.

'I feel like we're desecrating this place.' She mumbled, it felt wrong to be disrupting the final resting place of these great warriors, warriors who probably fought in the Horus Heresy if Janet's estimate was right. Said woman nudged Victoria.

'The man on the thrones holding something.' Victoria looked at her quiz-idly for a moment before the priest tapped her eye._ She must have some zoom function_. She thought.

'Alright everyone follow me, don't touch anything let's try and not disturb them if we can.' As they reached the Throne she had a better look at the marine sitting down on it. The armour wasn't ornate as the wolves didn't believe in too much of that stuff but it was obviously damaged and battered around. She noted a puncture in the stomach with blood long ago rusted on it, probably the cause of this person's death. The man was helmet-less, only a skull still attached to the spine disappearing into the suit indicating the body was inside. The left hand was holding a data-slate, the thing Janet must have seen from afar. Victoria knelt to the body, the others followed out of due reverence.

'Sorry my lord but duty dictates I must do this.' She told the corpse, it wouldn't feel right just to yank the thing out of his hand and she was sure the marine would understand.

She pulled it out easily enough and wasn't surprised any more at the fact it was still functional. Looking at the squad she had with her, all wide eyed and mystified she decided to read it out loud.

'If you are reading this, my last words I can only hope you are a loyal citizen of the Imperium, there didn't seem to be many when me and my brothers landed on this planet. I suppose it doesn't matter much I don't suspect any person will find this for a long time.'

'Well this isn't for you this is for me a dying old soldier and my brothers in the slim hope our legacy will live on. You are currently reading the last words of Captain Jaden Fox of the Space Wolves, third company, third platoon third pack, the 333. I'm going to start at the obvious place, our crash landing on this planet. It was near the end of what was beginning to be called the Horus Heresy, our forces had finally routed the damned traitors and we are cleaning up what's left of them.'

'Our squad after purging a nearby planet had stumbled on... I don't know what they are really, even to this day I think about the machine men that attacked us.' She looked up at Janet who just shrugged.

'Could be they were experimenting with abominable intelligence's when the wolves struck.'

'I heard rumours about some death machines on the east fringe of the galaxy.' Gunter mused.

'Never heard of em myself.' Victoria admitted.

'What's a machine man?' One of the tribals asked.

'I'll tell ya later just carry on commissar.' Janet told them, Victoria nodded.

'Machine men that attacked us. I can still hear the strange noise and flashes of green, they ripped apart us easily and we could barely damage them! They seemed weak against the daemon that had accidentally awoken them but I digress. After we took a strange pendant intending it to be proof of what we had stumbled upon, one you should find in my right hand.' Victoria noticed there was indeed a pendant, she picked it up to study. It was simple rope with a solid black slab on the bottom. It didn't seem all that strange to be honest so she pocketed it and carried on reading.

'We ran from the planet, space marines know no fear but that doesn't mean we're stupid, our plan was to get some reinforcements before coming back when we were hit by a parting gift. A lance of green took out our engines just as we were about to enter the warp, we flew off course and when we finally got out we were unfortunately heading right for this planet. Some clever manoeuvring from brother Haltix stopped us from exploding on impact.'

'Jaden is obviously Jraden and this Haltix must be Halatix. Seems the natives were worshipping space marines for some reason.' Gunter pointed out.

'Indeed.' Janet sounded like she didn't care, she was more interested in the story.

'We found we had landed near an Imperial colony, cut off when the heresy started, they had lost all chances at off planet travel and by the time of our arrival were relatively backwards, not by much but the lack of contact was already showing consequences. We tried to get our thunder hawk space bound again but we simply didn't have the resources and no one was responding to our hails... we were stuck on this planet.'

'Without any way of carrying on our duty to the legion we decided to follow our overall duty, we helped the humans survive here. The first hundred years weren't so bad but the decay of society had started to settle. We could see more and more colonists heading out and living as nomads would amongst the trees and the entire civilisation on this planet called Kellien sliding to the tribal stage. It took four hundred more years but my prediction was true.'

'Even worse these people, every generation they lost a bit of civility and every generation they fell into more superstition, some had started worshipping my brothers as gods! I can only imagine the rest of the galaxy worshipping the emperor now he could can no longer enforce the Imperial truth, I'm sure he would be appalled.' Victoria stopped talking, a silence spread out across the room as if the troops were not even there. This was a challenge against the faith they all had held since they were children and a challenge against the Imperium itself!

'Do remember the Emperor didn't ascend to godhood until he took to the golden throne, this marine would have not known about the throne since he was away on mission.' Janet pointed out, a nervous and shaky agreement sounded from them all, dogma was a tricky thing after all.

'She's right, just stay faithful, we'll talk to a priest when we get back and I'm sure he can sort this out for us.' Victoria told her squad which were getting more confident. She looked back down at the slate.

'I'm sure you are very interested in Kellien civilisation but I'm not writing this for them, I'm writing this for my brothers. Ah my brothers, Haltix, Nehg and Moka. They were the only things probably keeping me going in this forsaken place. Moka I'm sorry to say suffered permanent damage to the brain during impact, he is sound in mind but he simply didn't have the co-ordination any more. I've tried to get the people to stop saying "pulling a mooka" when someone does something stupid but my efforts seem to be in vain, I can only hope it doesn't go further.' A couple of awkward coughs from the twins.

'Moka eventually died due when falling from a tree, I know that sounds wrong for a great warrior to die from something so mundane but you should know he was holding up a house full of people, desperately trying to keep them away from a pack of Patex's. He managed to pin the house in a tree but slipped and well... he was and is still dearly missed.'

'Nehg... brother Nehg had never taken the news of our stranded nature very well, he raged all the time, one day when he was particularly drunk and angry I had to intervene to stop him from murdering a bunch of civilians he had decided to blame. It was an accident but that does not dull the guilt I still feel when I think about him. Without any way to carry on his duty and depression settling in I tell myself it was probably a favour, that it was him or me. It doesn't mean I believe it tho.'

'Last but not least Haltix, oh brother Haltix was probably the one brother amongst us all that thrived in this new place. This place seemed like the perfect place to live like the wolves our chapter is based on, fang to claw. With the natives regressing to tribals this element of his personality came to the fore and he revelled in the brutal wild. It's a well-known fact that marines don't age, at least not like humans do. But it seems Halatix had a mutation in his gene seed, he did age albeit at a slower pace but age he did. He died peacefully in bed ironically enough about a hundred years ago leaving me alone.'

'That's all the old gods accounted for.' Janet pointed to the graves.

'Still doesn't explain how lord Jaden fell.' Gunter cut the priest off, he must have wanted to hear the end as soon as possible. Taking the hint Victoria carried on.

'It's been a lonely few years, I've kept the city strong tho so maybe I'll be forgiven for my foolish mistake. I was hunting with some citizens, the animals here can get really big so my help is always appreciated. Well after 700 years I guess I just didn't take them as seriously as I should of, a local Yana caught me by surprise, a tusk right under my seal which should have kept it out if it had been serviced since we landed.'

'Well it got me, mortally. Astartes bodies can only take so much and this seemed to be that little bit too far. The natives dragged me back here and tried to help but any real medicine is now long gone. That's when I gave my orders, the city to be abandoned and made clear the valley is forbidden, none may enter. I do this in the hopes that someone, one day will find us and let the pack know where their lost brothers lie. I've sat upon this throne for hours now, trying to think what to write… I spose this is good enough. Everything is getting kind of dark, marines don't tend to die slowly or conscious. Strange. For Leman Russ, For the Imperium, For the Emperor.'

**OoOoOoOoOo**

'Still can't believe they've been worshipping space marines for so long.' Catherine mused as she made the final touches on her uniform, they were to have a huge parade before shipping out.

'I'm just surprised how thankful the space wolves were, I mean seriously.' When Julius sent out the communication about their findings a battle barge arrived no more than a week later, the wolves were nothing like their reputation. Quiet, thankful, placid. The brigadier suspected it was more out of trying to respect the long lost dead than any sort of thanks they felt for the finally formed 1st Kellien light regiment.

'Well it stands to reason.' She stepped over to Julius and fixed his medals he was failing to put on properly.

'True true.' The door to the creepily empty command bunker opened, Millers shiny head poked in.

'Sir Regiment is formed and ready for your speech.'

'Thank you sergeant.' The man left leaving Julius and Catherine with very unprofessional grins on their faces.

'Just think two more hours and we're off this planet.' Julius spoke first to which another very unprofessional groan of pleasure escaped from the Vahlallen.

'I know and I can't wait! Did those heavy winter gear sets arrive yet?' She asked. The Kelliens would be used to temperatures in the 50+ and would probably be freezing their buns off in more reasonable temperatures like the mid 20's so the obvious thing to do was bundle them up even if a bunch of soldiers standing in a sunny green field wearing winter gear would look funny.

'The ship we're leaving on has them, Traders gambit I think it's called.' Imperial navy ships were frankly already almost constantly in battle these days and civilian trade ships were picking up the slack so the warships could get to battle.

'Good… well you ready Brigadier Julius Hethrodge?' She grinned at him.

'Why I suppose I am Colonel Catherine Andrews.' The two exited their bunker to a series of stairs going up. At the top they could see the commissar looking east away from them trying to look very professional.

'Regiment! Ateeeent- tion!' Shimona's voice sounded extra loud, augmented by large speakers to either side of him. Stepping to the top Julius could see across the just over a thousand soldiers all standing at attention. Shimona stood to the side of the vox caster saluting him, he returned the salute smartly. Catherine stepped past the Tallarian and they both turned to the crowd. Julius stepped up to the caster.

'At ease.' A loud bang echoed across the field as everyone at the same time took the at ease position. Ordered by company and platoon from right to left they stood, a mixture of colours although brown skin and green uniforms stuck out for obvious reasons. At the far end of the field were four chimeras and a tank parked with their various crews standing at ease as well in front. Gunter, his twins and the tech priest Janet stuck out with their different uniforms.

'When I first arrived here over four years ago with the orders to form a regiment of imperial guard… well to tell you all the truth I thought I was screwed.' He started his speech.

'I may have been experienced but guard units generally come from PDF troops who prove their worth. To compound the fact I wasn't taking charge of a PDF regiment was the fact I found out this place was full of tribals!' He laughed briefly. The off worlders amongst the ranks chuckled a bit too.

'I thought to myself. Julius there is no way, NO WAY this is going to work. I'm proud to say you've all proven me wrong.' He noticed they all stood straighter, a boost to their pride.

'You all nailed the important facts of reconnaissance. You were excellent marksmen, you all crept through the jungle like shadows, and you all showed me what your planet could do. Now there were some problems with discipline, notable ones.' A dark chuckle from the native troops. 'But I spose little Nehg here took care of that problem.' Victoria pulled out the infamous Nehgron and gave it a few taps. More chuckles from everyone precent, notably lighter.

'Where before I couldn't see the end of the tunnel I now see a regiment of soldiers. An Imperial Guard regiment!' He shot his fist in the air which was met by a massive cheer.

'Now it's time to show the galaxy your planets worth, to show the galaxy the Kellien 1st's worth and to show the xeno, the mutant, the heretic just why they should fear you!' Another massive cheer blew over him.

'Now I could tell you we're going to a planet called Fehnfir, I could tell you it's in the Herlten system and I could tell you it's because we will defend this planet against the Tyranids of hive fleet Gorgen. I could tell you that but I know it doesn't matter because it doesn't matter which planet it's on, It doesn't matter which system it's in and it doesn't matter who you will fight. It doesn't matter because no matter where, when or who's it's against you will fight them.' He let silence descend across the field for a moment. 'You will fight them… and you'll win!' Another fist pump matched by the crowd and another, probably the biggest wave of cheering blew over him.

Julius looked over to Catherine and made eye contact.

'I guess we've got our regiment.'

**OoOoOoOoOoOo**

**AN: **Alrighty I hoped you liked it, a review would be nice but I'm sure you're all wondering a few things.

First off I don't have a beta so I apologise for the crappy grammar, but more importantly.

Action! Action will come don't you worry but I felt the first chapter should focus more on backstory of the planet, it's people and more importantly character building so when they finally do get stuck in you'll care. Newho cya round.


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